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Graham says IRS targeted his non-profits with audits

BOONE, N.C. -- In a blistering letter to President Barack Obama, the Rev. Franklin Graham said the IRS targeted the two non-profits he heads with an audit last year after the organizations took out ads urging people to support biblical principles on marriage and in choosing political candidates.

Graham says IRS targeted his non-profits with audits

Son of the Rev. Billy Graham calls IRS decision to audit 'morally wrong.'

President Barack Obama met with the Rev. Billy Graham and his son, Franklin Graham, at Graham's mountaintop home in Montreat, N.C., on Sunday, April 25, 2010.(Photo: Courtesy of Billy Graham Evangelical Association)

Story Highlights

Franklin Graham said he does not believe the audit was "a coincidence %u2014 or justifiable"

The groups continued to qualify for tax-exempt status and its returns were accepted as filed

Graham said audits followed groups' ads urging people to support biblical principles on marriage, choosing political candidates

BOONE, N.C. -- In a blistering letter to President Barack Obama, the Rev. Franklin Graham said the IRS targeted the two non-profits he heads with an audit last year after the organizations took out ads urging people to support biblical principles on marriage and in choosing political candidates.

In the letter, dated Tuesday, Graham said in light of recent revelations that the Internal Revenue Service targeted conservative groups with "tea party" or "patriot" in their names, he does not believe the audit was "a coincidence — or justifiable." Graham, son of famed Christian evangelist the Rev. Billy Graham, now heads the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association based in Charlotte, N.C., and Samaritan's Purse, a worldwide relief organization headquartered in Boone.

"I am bringing this to your attention because I believe that someone in the administration was targeting and attempting to intimidate us," Graham concluded in the letter. "This is morally wrong and unethical — indeed some would call it 'un-American.'"

Graham noted that Obama said earlier this week that the IRS "operating in anything less than a neutral and nonpartisan way" is "outrageous" and contrary to the country's traditions.

"Mr. President, the IRS has already publicly acknowledged it operated in a less than neutral and nonpartisan way," Graham wrote. "We also now know that the target of their improper actions was much wider than political or Tea Party organizations. Will you take some immediate action to reassure Americans we are not in a new chapter of America's history — repressive government rule?"

Obama said on Wednesday that he's accepted the resignation of acting IRS commissioner Steven Miller in the aftermath of the "controversy surrounding this audit."

In May 2012, the BGEA took out full-page newspaper ads statewide supporting the Amendment One legislation that amended the state Constitution to specify that marriage is between a man and a woman. In the fall, the BGEA ran national newspaper ads encouraging voters to "cast our ballots for candidates who base their decisions on biblical principals and support the nation of Israel."

The ads featured a picture of Billy Graham and asked people to "pray with me that America will remain one nation under God."

Graham said the ads were paid for with funds given by "friends of our ministry for this purpose." He also noted that after the election, they received notification that the organizations would continue to qualify for tax-exemption under federal law and that the tax returns were accepted as filed.

Chris Cooper, a political scientist at Western Carolina University, said the IRS' actions in targeting conservative groups were remarkably ill-conceived and play into conservatives' fears of the Democratic Party in general.

"The knock on the Democratic Party is that it has been associated with big government run out of control," Cooper said. "These kinds of accusations don't do anything to challenge that. It's bad for the Democrats, but it's particularly bad because it plays into people's preconceived notions of the Democratic Party."

As far as whether the ads were political in nature to begin with and may have warranted scrutiny on the nonprofits' tax-exempt status, Cooper said that is a "muddy" area in America because groups have a right to free speech.

"I think they're political, but the question is whether they're electioneering," Cooper said. "They're not calling for or against the election of a particular candidate, so it's a really muddy area. My sense is they were on the legal side of it."